Saintlike Patience
by Miss Forrester
Summary: Starscream is an insufferable glitch, a mech who just can't seem to do anything right, and many believe he should've offlined vorns ago. Some don't understand how he still continues to clutch onto his miserable life (or why). However, the Seeker has nothing to worry about, no rejection or scorn to fear from Cai. (Or does he?) Either way, he's fallen too deep to back out now.


And it seemed to me that Dante's face was a map of the world. A world without any darkness. Wow, a world without darkness. How beautiful was that?

- Benjamin Alire Saenz

There had been a point, once upon a time, that Cai Ma-Lin understood himself perfectly. Everything in his life had made so much sense, so much _fucking sense_, and he couldn't have felt more proud of himself. Cai had been so close, _so close_, to getting everything he had ever wanted.

To passing the exams, to getting a license, to getting a _real _position of _honor_ at Harvard, of all places, and his mother was doing so well with Enlai over in Shanghai, what with all the money King Drew was offering her for his studies.

But that had all been before he'd gotten that damned Ferrari. Cai knew he should have just gotten a cheaper model, something not so expensive, not so troublesome, but Serena had insisted, and after everything the Massimos had done for him, he thought maybe it was just better to appease her by accepting her generous offer.

_My foot._

All that car had done for him was cause him a never-ending headache. He was even questioning everything he'd ever believed, starting to suspect innocent people of doing things they would never dream of thinking about, starting to lose his patience with his own close friend, Gwen Herondale (though to be honest, she'd always been rather irritating in her recklessness).

And this was the last straw. Cai Ma-Lin was not a fighter. He was a scholar, an intellectual person of education, not some street rat. And yet he'd lost his temper too quickly, and it had ended in a broken nose (not his).

(That brat shouldn't have called Gwen something so offensive.)

(Especially not in front of him.)

(Not when he was all but PMSing.)

Though he was the one who had lost his temper, he blamed it on the damn car. He probably didn't know (claimed not to know, Cai scoffed) that the Oriental boy had spent all night worrying about his wounds and where the hell he could have gone in such a state, but it caused him to be grumpy, with a shorter fuse than he had ever been guilty of, and he had become downright violent.

He couldn't have just insulted the kid, could he?

Now Cai was under investigation, though the Principal had promised it wouldn't take long to discover that he had been provoked, and that they were willing to let it slide, because this was his first offense, and he was usually such a _star_ pupil.

(Until he had met Starscream.)

Starscream was ruining his _life_!

He wished he could just choke some sense into the bastard, but unfortunately, that would make him no better than the Decepticon asshole he so despised.

(Not Starscream, Megatron.)

(Though the Seeker was the source of all his grief.)

(So, Starscream, too.)

(If he could even begin to manage choking the mech.)

The sight of his home did wonders, but he was still breathing heavily, in barely subdued rage, hoping that for his sake, Starscream just left him alone, today.

But no such luck.

The Energon Seeker (was he right?) was lying across his bed when he walked into the bedroom he had been lent by Serina Massimo for the duration of the program.

He fought the urge to turn and flee at once, for he wasn't really in the mood to deal with the Seeker's arrogance and stupidity, but he figured that since Starscream didn't even find his actions wrong, he didn't want to let the asshole know he'd bothered Cai, in any way.

He would lose their little game if he gave any hint that he was infuriated by the mere sight of the Seeker.

"You know, I'll admit, I didn't expect this lousy thing to be very comfortable," began the Seeker, pointing out the mattress he was reclining on, "but it's a lot better than a recharge berth, I'll tell you that much. I can see why you fleshlings spend so much time in them."

(The look Cai gave him, a mixture of exasperation and something the mech could have _sworn_ was fondness, was enough to almost sober up his bragging mood. Almost.)

"Humans, asshole." Whoops. He took a deep breath, though it was too late. Starscream looked momentarily startled by the harshness in his tone, but then a look of victory turned his metal lips upward.

Cai found himself wishing Starscream wouldn't take this form so often. It would be a lot more difficult for a coward like him to get very angry at a giant robot.

(All right, the Seeker mentally cheered. He had finally, _finally_, managed to get the proper reaction from the fleshling.)

(So why did he feel a sense of dread in his sparkchamber?)

"What's wrong?" the Decepticon second-in-command's voice was sickeningly sweet, taunting. "Your fleshling under armor get stuck up your tail pipes?"

"I will rip out _your _tail pipes myself, right now, I swear it, Starscream, if you don't go make yourself busy, elsewhere," he tried to sound threatening, but the Seeker only graced him with a barking laugh. Cai rolled his eyes, then turned, abruptly and slammed the door closed.

He didn't have to look to know the Seeker had jumped almost a foot in the air. "This _fleshling _isn't in the mood for your shit today, conehead."

(There was a delicious shudder that racked his back struts at the sound of the pure _rage _in the fleshling's voice. He considered that Cai might have sounded very attractive just now, then backtracked and considered that maybe Megatron had hit him a lot harder than he'd originally thought.)

(Ick, he couldn't believe he'd found Cai _attractive_, even just for a nanoklik.)

The Seeker held up a servo, mock-horrified, then interjected, "Why, is the fleshling _cross _with me?"

The young man scowled, more to himself than anything (since he didn't want to keep giving Starscream the satisfaction of knowing Cai was angry with him), and responded, curtly, "Yes."

"It's probably better if you're cross with me," remarked the Seeker. "So much saintlike patience cannot be good for anyone."

(He fully meant that. How Cai Ma-Lin could be so - so - _patient_ was disgusting and beyond ridicule, at this point.)

(Starscream knew how annoying he could get, so why had Cai just waited until now to take note?)

(Was he being kicked out for good? He tried to fight the sickening sense of worry, and failed miserably.)

Cai whirled, and his eyes were ablaze, he just knew, though he didn't expect this would make a lick of difference in the mocking tone the Seeker's voice had adopted.

(That look should be against the law. It wasn't natural, not on Cai's face. Cai was patient, and kind, and understanding, not an angry wreck of nerves. What the slag had he done to deserve that? How the slag had he fragged up, this time?)

He said a single phrase, one he never thought he would repeat after having heard only once before.

The boy knew Starscream wouldn't immediately understand, and was well aware that despite this, he could just as easily, and just as quickly, search it up in his freakish processor.

(Was that the equivalent of a brain, Cai wondered?)

The Seeker was appropriately puzzled, but once he had understood, he was laughing in that maddening keen that made Cai both want to cover his ears and punch him in his metal face (though he knew opting for the second choice might only wind up in his own self-inflicted pain).

"What a dirty thing to say to your superior, fleshling."

The younger boy gave him a look that could only be described as _vaguely unfriendly_, and then he was shrugging, turning his dark eyes away. "Oops."

It was something he himself had said so often, either to pretend to feel regret about his mistakes (with Megatron), or to pretend he had no idea why the plan had gone wrong (with Megatron).

And yet when Cai said it, in so dismissive a tone, the Seeker suddenly understood, with a cold rage washing over him, why it was that the Decepticon Warlord despised when he said it.

It was unbelievably _annoying_.

"Oh, no," the Seeker was hissing, a noise that came across as highly ultrasonic to the poor boy's fragile human ears. "You don't get to pull that slag with me."

"And you, _Decepticon_, don't reserve the right to demand anything of me," snapped the fleshling, to his utter dismay. Just who did he think he was, adopting that tone of voice with hi-

(Holy slag, had the fleshing just used his alignment as a means of addressing him? Who even _did _that aside from the Autobots? Why was Cai so slagging weird?)

(Though he couldn't exactly deny that the attention Cai must have paid him (when he was rambling) to know all that was nothing short of flattering.)

(And that _authority_...)

The Seeker felt heat surge through his chassis, and knew he was in definite trouble. Especially considering his fans were kicking on to try and cool him down.

As if it were even remotely natural to feel so slagging turned on by a damned fleshling. (Maybe it was the pure fact that this was unnatural and broke every rule Megatron had ever laid down that made him so hot and bothered about it, in the first place?)

Cai was glaring down at him, just glaring, the steadiness in his gaze unrelenting, and then Starscream was groaning in a mixture of need and shame.

The boy's face twisted in his concern, but before he could get much more of a word in (and possibly risk arousing the Seeker further - he was heating up enough as it _was_), the mech had reached for that ridiculous collar of his and pulled him onto the recharge berth the fleshling slept on.

Bed, was it?

Ignoring his momentary confusion of what the berth was called, Starscream took a nanoklik to enjoy the look of shock and - was that _embarrassment_?- on Cai's face. Then, he was doing what he had (reluctantly) fantasized about for too fragging long.

His metal lips pressed, almost desperately, hungrily, to the fleshling's own, and he wasn't surprised to discover that they were just as soft and warm as he had thought they would be.

Cai was thrown into a shocked stupor, mostly because, despite knowing that they should be doing anything but _this_, he felt no strong urge to pull away.

He had considered that kissing a mech, or having any intimate contact with one (after he'd experienced the Seeker's arrogance firsthand) would be wholly unpleasant.

So he had no idea what to do, how to react, when he realized that the metal was cooling against his own overheated body, and that Starscream's lips (was it even appropriate to think about them in this manner?) were actually very smooth.

And he definitely had not expected to feel this nice with the Seeker's servos coming up to brush almost gently through his long black hair, careful not to undo all of his hard work.

Starscream pressed closer, and he felt something heating up against his thigh (and knew it wasn't him), and that was how he found out that the Seeker was aroused by him (and probably had been for a very long time), not just mildly attracted.

It was hard to form a coherent thought with the rush that came from doing something he shouldn't, and with someone he shouldn't even talk to so _casually_, no less, or with the way the Seeker's whimpers, high and so obviously _inhumane_, jumbled his thinkpan.

But he managed to push his friend away (were they even that much? or did this make them more than just that? would the Seeker even consider that sort of thing with a fleshling, if this was indeed a loss of control and no more?).

The Seeker's vibrant red optics caught onto his, almost pleadingly, but just as he was raising a servo, to pull him into another kiss, or maybe just to pull him down into an awkward embrace, he stopped himself, froze, reminded himself who exactly he was with.

"Starscream," Cai's brow was furrowed, face giving nothing away, not even the tiniest hint of a blush (which admittedly only made him more attractive - that he could keep his cool in a heated moment like that would have made him a slagging hot mech).

He didn't have the heart to respond, and barely mustered up the energy to whisper, voice hoarse, chassis aching and spark demanding certain things he wasn't sure he could comply with, "Don't. Don't ruin this with a lecture, just this once."

Cai's jaw clenched shut, and his expression lost its tension, but the Seeker saw the confusion, the curiosity, still evident in his dark eyes. Mercifully enough, he ceded to the mech's request, just this once, as he had asked.

Starscream knew it was all a matter of time before someone spilled the slagging secret for him, considering that all of the Nemesis would probably find out about this thanks to that fragger, Soundwave. So, he vented a deep intake, and then:

"You know I'm a coward, a cheat, a liar, a traitor, and a killer. My spark probably shouldn't even pulse anymore with all the close encounters I've had with offlining. I feel like I've been wronged, like I should have been the leader of the Decepticons, but even though I'm much smarter than Megatron when it comes to strategy, I also know I'm a bigger fool than anyone can ever guess. I really would have liked to claim this planet, this pathetic planet, as my own, for the cause, for Cybertron, for proving everyone wrong when they whisper I'm a failure."

The boy said nothing, and he continued, feeling his spark weight heavier with fear in his sparkchamber, his mind battling the urge to keep speaking, to keep being _vulnerable_.

He remembered what this fleshling had told him once.

_Letting yourself be vulnerable isn't always a weakness. _

One look into his strangely warm eyes, such human eyes, had confirmed that Cai Ma-Lin really believed this, and maybe if the fleshling believed it, the one who was smart and kind and had such an open spark (slag, he meant heart), then he could believe it wasn't such bullslag.

"And you know, once upon a time, even after I'd met you, even after you'd shown me such appalling hospitality, my instinct wouldn't be to spare you, or your planet, or anything, and I would still want to destroy everything just because it challenged me just like everyone else did. And the most embarrassing thing about this is that I _know _it's wrong, but I just can't seem to stop myself from doing terrible things, especially when I know that someone, somewhere, is actually trying to give a slag, because I hate being a pity case, and I want fear, respect, not sympathy. But I'm not saying this to let you know how much I hate you for making me admit this."

He was sitting up now, and the fleshling was giving him such a curious look, listening intently, and Starscream flushed with the pleasure of realizing that he actually gave a slag about what the Seeker had to say. Maybe Airachnid was right and he was softening up, but at the moment, he couldn't care less.

Cai Ma-Lin cared, and that was a lot more than he could say for anyone else. He had learned from his long, insufferable life that anyone who cared should not be tossed aside. He couldn't let this human go, not now, not ever.

The boy had been his only source of energy, a new reason to fight back, to survive, in the ongoing war against the Autobots, though at the same time, he wondered whether he even really wanted to fight alongside the Decepticons, anymore.

There was nothing there for him. No glory. No leadership. No victory. No Cai Ma-Lin. If they won, Earth would be gone, _Cai _would cease to exist, and he would rip out his own spark in the realization that he had suffered so much for nothing.

He had toyed with the idea of joining the Autobots a few times during the war, but now Starscream wished he had really done it, earlier, so he could have maybe met Cai without seeing that spark of disappointment, of anger, directed towards him.

But it was too late for regrets, as it always was, as it always would be. Now, all he could do was explain himself and hope it didn't end in his regretting having become _vulnerable_.

"I'm saying this because you make me _want _sympathy."

The human boy's eyes had softened, and he could see that the anger had evaporated, somewhere, Primus only knows where, in just a nanoklik, like it always did.

(There goes that saintlike patience, all over again.)

"Oh, Starscream, I do sympathize with you, I do, but that's not really important, is it?" inquired the fleshling, and suddenly, his spark felt cold.

"What did I say about interrupting me?" he was just terrified of hearing another fragging rejection. (He had heard too many already in his life.)

Cai saw the look in his optics, couldn't decipher it, and closed his mouth, signaling that the Seeker could move on, that he would wait.

"I just wanted," he was suddenly uncertain, wondering what the boy had been going to say. "I just wanted, _oh slag it_!"

The Seeker moved, fully intending to leave at once, to save himself the humiliation of spilling all his spark out onto the floor for the human to see and poke holes into with his careful scrutiny.

But Cai was faster. His fingers barely missed his frame, only just managing to make contact with one of Starscream's folded wings, and the Seeker shuddered, freezing, wondering with terror if the fleshling knew how sensitive those blasted things were.

His grip became firm on the mech's wing, and then his thumb was rubbing over the sensor nodes, almost absently, and Starscream knew, without looking, that Cai was doing this without thinking, without knowing, just trying to comfort him.

(Was he?)

But the Seeker couldn't contain the shudders racking his back struts, and after some time, he asked, in a shrill voice, one he was embarrassed to hear come out of his own mouth (after all, he wasn't designated "Starscream" for nothing), "Can you let go of my wing? It's actually really sensitive, fleshling."

The boy sighed, whether in retaliation to his words or the offensive name, he wasn't sure. But he did let go. Only in favor of placing a hand, a reassuring gesture, on his metal-plated shoulder.

"Starscream," he said, voice firm, and the Seeker turned, half-expecting to be lectured, again, for maybe the thousandth time since they'd met (those were the times when Cai Ma-Lin talked the most, after all, and also when Starscream learned much more about fleshling culture than he cared to know), but he was instead surprised by another processor-scrambling kiss.

Initiated by the boy, himself.

Already sensitive from the wing-stroking, it was all he could do not to overload right there, on the boy's berth. He clenched his interfacing panels shut tightly, using his systems to force them to _stay closed_, despite how much it ached, and instead leaned into the surprisingly passionate gesture.

Who knew the boy could use his mouth for something other than blabbering on about things he didn't care about?

The Seeker squeaked after some time, his fans turning on automatically to try and cool down his systems, when he felt something prodding his glossa, and realized that the boy had engaged him in quite the inappropriate kiss, indeed, for a Decepticon and its prey.

He whined, and whimpered, but the boy wasn't letting up, so he eventually just slumped into the human's grasp, letting Cai wrap him up in his warm embrace, something he had only ever felt in his dreams. And Primus, did it feel better than he could have ever imagined.

His arms were firm, but not painfully so, and he could actually get comfortable in the embrace without hurting himself, unlike with Megatron. Then, he was keening, without thinking, when the boy's wandering fingers found his damn wings again.

The nodes were practically aching for his touch (as was something else a little more south of the chassis), and he found himself wondering dizzily how it was that his supersonic keen, the one he only used when in intense distress, pain, or, he supposed, pleasure, wasn't hurting the fleshling.

(Or, at least, not putting a stopper in his plans.)

(Whatever said plans were.)

Then, the boy pulled back once more, fingers digging into the chinks of his armor, and pulling him closer, into another kiss. By the time he pulled back once more, when not engaging Starscream in very long, very heated glossa-interactions, the Seeker was having a hard time venting without feeling his systems overheating.

And it seemed the boy was having a similar problem with his own venting (breathing?). His face was flushed a very pretty color, one that he barely had time to enjoy before it was gone, replaced with a bright grin that had the Seeker's interfacing valve aching to be opened, but he resisted, knowing fragging well that he'd have to do something about this in private.

"I only said my sympathy wasn't important, Starscream," spoke the human, voice oddly low and intimate, gentle, even, "because it pales in comparison to what else I feel in my silly, suicidal heart when I look at you in all your infuriating glory."

The Seeker wasn't sure what the boy would say, but he had a good idea, and it terrified him, because what if he was wrong, like he always was? What if the fleshling said something else, something that would win their blasted game?

They had bet that the other couldn't get under their comrade's skin (or armor, in his case). He wasn't sure... were they still playing that slagging game?

"Don't say anything you don't mean, fleshling."

His tone was downright nasty, but the flash of hurt was gone from the human's dark eyes before he could fully register it in his processor, and the boy was giving him a serious look.

"You don't think you deserve to be loved, Starscream, is that what's bothering you? Is that why you want to be feared, instead? Because being noticed in some way is better than being wholly ignored?"

The Seeker groaned, in pain, in anguish, and there was a surprised flash of regret in the boy's eyes. But the damage had been done. "Yes, yes, are you slagging happy? Congratulations. You've won. I've lost, again, like I always fragging do."

Cai began to laugh, but then he wiped something away from his own face, and Starscream realized there was no humor in his laugh. He didn't find this funny. He found it incredibly sad.

His own conclusion surprised him. When had he come to think he could understand a fleshling, much less a complex one like Cai Ma-Lin?

(When had he cared enough to stop and wonder about a fleshling in the first place, actually?)

"Why would I be happy, Starscream? I'm saying this because I understand what it feels like to wish someone would acknowledge you."

The Decepticon Seeker couldn't believe his audio receptors. Had they glitched at just the wrong time? _Cai Ma-Lin cared what other people thought about him_? No slaggin' way.

The human saw the look in his eyes, and sighed. "Yeah, I know, pathetic, huh? I act so indifferent, but I think it must be because it hurts to admit it. You call yourself a liar, a coward, but at least you have the guts to admit it. I've denied it all my life, _all my life_, Starscream, and tried so hard to always do the right thing, do my homework, get perfect grades, be the perfect role model, set a good example, _be a good boy Cai, _ _take care of your mother Cai_, just in the slightest hope that somebody, _anybody _would notice. And you know, it works, sometimes."

"Does it?" he ventured to ask, despite not being so certain he wanted to hear the depressing truth. The Seeker felt the overwhelming urge to hug the boy, or say it was okay, but he knew it wasn't. He, of all people, knew nothing was okay, and life sucked, and it wasn't going to get any easier.

"Yeah. But you know what I just realized? I don't want it to work, not if it doesn't mean anything. I don't want to be a blip in history, a good kid, a good student, if it doesn't mean anything, if it will never mean anything." The boy's eyes were shining, passionate, and the Seeker felt himself growing enthralled with the fleshling's words, feeling that someone was finally, _finally_, making sense.

(Not just talking slag out of their exhaust pipe.)

(Like Optimus Prime.)

(Or Megatron.)

(Or the Autobots, in general.)

(Or the rest of the fleshlings.)

(Or Megatron.)

"I want to _be _somebody, even if it means I'm terrible, a disgrace to humanity. I want to be remembered, even if it's for a terrible reason, and you know what I think? I think everyone else does, too, but they're still too busy denying it to themselves, covering their ears because it doesn't fit in with their pretty little pictures of what life needs to be, because it doesn't fit into any one shape, because what everyone wants is to do something amazing, something terrible, something devastating, and be _thanked _for it. And for the person who thanks them to really _mean _it, not just as a passing thought."

Starscream wasn't sure what to say, anymore. He had always thought about this sort of thing, bitterly, tucked away in the darkest recesses of his processor, but never had he heard his own thoughts, his own anguish, worded so precisely.

But that was just Cai Ma-Lin, he supposed.

He had seen the enrapturing effect this human had on the others around him, and he supposed he should be glad he wasn't the only one effected by his every _word _like this.

But he wasn't glad. He was furious, insanely jealous, selfish.

He saw the reverence in Gwen Herondale's eyes, the fear of disappointing him. He saw the respect in the old woman's, the grandmother of Herondale, and he saw the unconditional love for the boy in the eyes of Serina and Engel Massimo, despite his not being their legitimate son. He could only imagine the awe in his own carrier's, his own creator's, eyes, and felt immense anger, indignation, because Starscream believed no one, no slagging fleshling or Cybertronian (Autobot or Decepticon), could ever understand just how amazing, how beautiful, how worthy of greatness this one human boy was, not like he could.

No one could ever adore and love Cai Ma-Lin like this foolish, disillusioned failure of a Seeker could.

"And you know what, Starscream," the boy was saying, and he felt a pang of anguish because he hadn't heard all of his no doubt awe-inspiring speech, "I am glad to have met you, even if I didn't want to admit it, because you have shown me my own shame, and you have made me realize it's not wrong to want those things. That it's only human, only Cybertronian, only _natural_, to feel that way. To feel lonely, unwanted, and to want recognition, to want greatness."

Starscream couldn't stop himself. It was slipping out before he could control it, before he could censor his own thoughts.

"You are already greater than anyone I've ever known."

The boy paused, puzzled, questioning whether Starscream had _really_ just said that to a _mere fleshling_.

Then, he was smiling, a brilliant gesture.

"I only know greatness when I'm with you, Starscream."

All he could emit in response was a gasp, a glitch in his intake, and then the boy's lips were covering his own, the rest of the world, and his shame, and the Autobots, and Megatron, and all those slaggers, they just fell away.

Right now, it was just him, Starscream, the mech, not the Seeker, and his savior, the only truth he had ever known, Cai Ma-Lin.

And he decided that maybe that slagging saintlike patience wasn't so bad, after all, if it meant he stood a chance in the Pit with this bringer of greatness.

In his spark echoed the words he had always wanted to hear, never to give, and he only wished Cai could read his processor as well as he often seemed to.

The words he had heard whispered between the closest of Sparkmates, between the Sparkbound of Cybertron.

_Your spark is of pure light that brightens life and casts a shadow on fears. _

And finally, finally, he knew what that meant, and he knew it to be true, because when he laid his optics on Cai's brilliant smile, he couldn't think of anything better than that one truth.


End file.
